


When we smiled so easily

by goodinthisworldworthfightingfor



Category: Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 06:50:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17462663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodinthisworldworthfightingfor/pseuds/goodinthisworldworthfightingfor
Summary: Angelica returns to demand answers from the man responsible for her missing memories.





	When we smiled so easily

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Wedding of Angelica Bane, Part 4 - Bane Family Meeting](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/450068) by How the Quest Was Won. 



> This is based on an episode of our D&D 5e actual play podcast ("Bane Family Meeting"). This encounter was the culmination of about half a year of planning and character development with my DM (it finally happened in our fifth season), and I couldn't get it out of my head. This is probably the most emotional roleplaying scene I've done so far (I literally felt shaken for days afterward) but I felt like the podcast couldn't quite get across what was going on inside her head. I think without getting Angelica's full perspective, you won't really understand her reaction later in the plot when **[spoilers]** she finally meets Casselyn **[/end spoilers]**. I figured if my party seemed confused by her reaction, our listeners might be too. So here you go! This is her side of the story.

Even before she entered the room, she had resolved to kill him if things went wrong. 

It was not a decision she made lightly. To be honest, it worried her that she could always feel her sword Bellator tugging to end a life. It was like playing a song in an unfamiliar key—you had to constantly distrust your own fingers. She had done her best to resist those instincts whenever she could. But if there was ever a time she needed to be willing to use Bellator to make a point, it was now. She was certain that the man in front of her had something to do with her strange situation, and she couldn’t afford to take any chances. As she ducked through the door from the secret passageway, she took a deep breath and clutched Bellator tighter—stolen heirloom, blade as long as she was tall, golden inlay catching the light cast by the hearth as she emerged into the king’s room. So many things had been taken from her by this man—at least she had taken this one sword back.

She stared at the back of her father’s head as he bent over his desk. Regalus Bane, King of Phylor, holder of many secrets, one of them the key to her past. Mentally she shivered, though her body did not react—somehow she had learned to melt her fear and forge it into anger. She tried to step forward, but found her feet were stuck to the floor.

He suddenly turned, flashing her a cold smile, his black eyes betraying no wonder that she was there in his private chambers. “It’s been a long time, Angelica.” Her heart faltered, just for a beat. Even though you suspect the dragon will know your every move, you might still hope to surprise him in his own lair. He motioned for her to sit down in the plush green chairs by the fireplace. Memories were funny things. She had a brief vision of herself standing in this same exact spot, small enough that the combination of her thick blonde hair and the weighty tiara pulled her head down to stare at her feet. If she plucked harder at the memory, his voice vibrated, and she could hear several things at once—his voice telling her to stand up straight, to be quiet, to do better, that life was not fair. She saw herself nodding, biting her lip, forcing herself to be the daughter he wanted.

She mentally shook herself to dispel the thoughts. Here she was now, her hair chopped short and dyed raven black, looted armor on her back and a magnificent sword in her hands. She was no longer that same girl. Who knew what other memories this room contained that no longer struck a chord for her? 

“No.” She steeled herself against the instincts to obey, to sit in that chair across from him. “I have some questions. And I’m not leaving until they are answered."

“I will answer your questions if you act in a civil way and sit down by the fireplace,” he said, his voice quiet and even. Her whole life she had submitted to that tone of voice, knowing how easily it could transform from calm to fury. Not today. 

“No, I am not going to play by your rules,” she said with what she hoped sounded like resolve. 

He considered her for a moment, then shrugged and turned back to his desk.

Another sudden spike of memory: his back turned in dismissal when she pleaded for her mother’s whereabouts, his refusal to answer, dismissing her with a flick of his finger. Suddenly Bellator was flashing in her hands, her blood pounding in her ears. This time she would not leave the room in tears, the taste of failure on her tongue. “Turn around and answer my questions, Father.” 

He kept writing. His pen scratched on the paper, and she had a fleeting impressing the pen was digging directly into the folds of her brain. Obey, it wrote. Submit. Forget. She found she was trembling.

She snapped out of it, driving herself forward and impulsively pushing his papers off the desk before she could second guess herself. “Talk to me!” she shouted, hoping it would hide the catch in her voice.

He did not even look at her. “Even after everything you have been through, you are still such a child.”

A child? she thought. What did he think it meant to be a child? To disobey? But she had no recollection of ever disobeying this man. His presence structured the melody of her childhood. She had only ever harmonized, being careful that each note aligned as it should.

But there was one memory that did not fit, snatched out of the abyss. Two little girls together, one of them unknown. A small arm, clothed so plainly, reaching out in wonder and hesitantly plucking a string. Herself smiling—had she really ever smiled that easily?—and, taking the familiar harp in her arms, strumming a confident run. Gesturing for her friend—her friend? had she ever had friends?—to take a turn. The girl taking the harp like it was a delicate egg and strumming, not nearly as confidently, but playing a run all the same. The two of them dissolving in laughter on the floor when the door suddenly opened—him—his anger, his shouting, a cruel slap to the girl’s face—now she was alone, sobbing, alone with him, scrambling backwards—she saw him look at the harp and suddenly knew—screaming for him to forgive her, begging him to stop—that sickening crunch, the strings flopping—all alone, all alone, all alone with the pieces. The harp broken, just like her memories.

A child, she thought. The child had begged. But I am no longer a child, for I have learned never to beg. You can only beg for pity or love, and I want neither.

She turned on her heel, striding toward the chair, and he turned back around, watching her with satisfaction. Just before she sat, she caught his eye and drove the sword into his wooden floor. It made a satisfying crunch. She resisted grinding it in further.

He frowned slightly but rose, walking to the chair across from her. “What are your questions?” 

She leaned forward, suddenly breathless. She had so many questions and had waited so long. She almost couldn’t decide where to begin. 

The most pressing question first. “Why did you hire the archmage to wipe my memories?”

“It was that or have you killed for treason.”

She could hardly believe it—he had admitted to his crime, that easily. She had imagined she would have to tear it out of him, slapping down lies like flies. “Why? What, what happened?”

“You—you know we tried to—" She could not believe it, her father tripping over his words! “—to take away your violent impulses and we were hoping that we removed enough memories to achieve that but clearly we were unsuccessful. You—” he hesitated. “You led a coup. You—you killed your brother!”

“What!” She almost laughed. Imagine her, hardly able to kill when her life depended on it, striking at her useless brother. “What, why doesn’t the kingdom know about this?” she scoffed. If her brother were dead, it would not be a secret.

But then—she had a tiny flash of memory. Standing over her brother’s bed, blood splattered across her armor, blood seeping out of her brother’s chest. His stupid lips formed in a small “oh” as his head fell, eyes wide.

Amazing, she thought. That was me? I could do that? A small unbidden flash of pride. She had always known her brother would be a bad king, with his foppish parties and dull mind and unbridled tongue. But she had not ever thought to do anything about it. The throne did not care that she was the eldest or the wittiest or the wisest, it only cared that he was male. His fate was something she had resigned herself to living with—but the forgotten Angelica had thought otherwise. “But I didn’t actually kill him – I saw him today! But he’s here!”

“We had him resurrected, along with all the other people you killed.” He emphasized the last word, his fingers curling on the armrests, a single fleck of spit flying from his mouth.

“But why?” she asked, truly curious. “Why did I do that?”

He motioned toward his desk, the papers haphazardly scattered to the floor.

“No, I’m sure I had a better reason than that.” She mentally kicked his implications aside, though they crouched at the end of her consciousness. “All right, okay, I have a temper”—she had been forced to admit that to herself, as much as she hated to think she resembled her father in any way—“but I don’t kill people.”

“I blame myself,” he said, and she looked up, surprised. As if he had ever blamed himself for anything in his life. “I—I tried to make you strong. I tried to make you stern and strong but I just made you cruel and from what I heard about what you did in Elharbrin, you have not changed at all.”

“I am not cruel!” she exclaimed. “I, I am – ugh.” Elharbrin! What a joke. They had robbed a crooked steward, burning one shed and fleeing the town—and they could not even do that without taking time to restore the stupid tavern owner’s infuriating magic tankard. She had almost forgotten the skillful way her father could twist her words and actions, derailing her from everything she needed to say while she tripped over explanations she did not owe him.

“All right,” she said, coolly dismissing the accusation and moving on. “Why did you replace me with a fake daughter?”

He stared into the fire. “Honestly I didn’t.”

“What do you mean?” That too was unexpected. “Who is this person, why is someone pretending to be me?”

“Honestly, I have no idea,” he said, still not looking at her, “and I don’t care.”

She tried to shrug that off. “So you are just going to go ahead with the wedding knowing it’s a sham?” She chuckled at how ridiculous that sounded, but as he stared back at her blankly, she realized he was not joking. “What about your heir?” she added. Surely he cared about that one thing from her, if nothing else.

“Drylus is my heir,” he said dryly, and she mentally shook herself. Of course. There was always Drylus. For a moment, she had almost forgotten that the throne had no use for her children. No use for her.

“All right, fine,” she spat. “Does Saltine know?” It hurt to say his name, but she asked anyway. She could not help caring if he had consented to this or had been duped like the rest of the kingdom.

“He is a bit of an idiot,” her father said, snorting. “I think you have always seen him through rose-colored glasses.” 

She blinked, hard. So he did not know. So he did think he was marrying the real Angelica. Sure, an idiot. But a sincere one. She tucked that away for later—she could not be distracted from her mission by caring about Saltine. It was over for them. It had been over for a long time.

“Listen, you knew I was coming here tonight,” she said, appealing to her father’s pride. “You are too smart to let me come in unprotected. What do you want from me?”

“I want you to be happy. I want you to let this wedding happen.” 

“What do you mean you want me to be happy?” she cried, unable to keep her rage from spilling out. “You replaced me! Someone else is marrying my fiancé! What do you mean you want me to be happy?”

He sighed, leaning back, looking at the ceiling and then at the fire, not at her, never at her. “When we removed your memories, we hoped that you would be content with a life as a lady of the court. But if I have learned anything in these past few years, it’s that even with us having done that, you will not be content with the life of a lady of the court.” He massaged his temples with his fingers, as if she were the source of a constant headache. Which, she realized with a start, was probably true. “Do you really want to go up to Cryker and start producing royal heirs and never leaving the palace, or do you want to go around going on adventures?”

She was distracted from answering by a motion in the window—Nyx (of course it was Nyx) making some frantic gestures. The diamond, she remembered. They needed a diamond, or two, from the king. Or else Nyx would not survive the poison in her blood. And she would have one more memory of a friend lost forever.

“Did anyone survive?” she hissed, knowing she had to ask but dreading the answer. “Anyone in my rebellion? What happened to them?”

“You ironically, were betrayed,” her father answered dryly, “and that is the only reason why I am still alive and you are not queen of Phylor. One of your compatriots, Casselyn, after you killed your brother she saw in you, well, what you had become. She did not think that would be good for Phylor and so she came and alerted my guards, and then she fled.”

Casselyn. She struck the name, and it rang true, familiar but forgotten. Casselyn. Casselyn must be the little girl in her memory. She felt suddenly lightheaded, holding the name close. She had feared the worst: an execution, a prolonged torture, a skeleton left in the dungeon. Against all hopes, her friend was alive! Her heart skipped a beat. Against all hopes, there was someone who remembered! Someone to tell her what she had done? Someone to tell her who she was! She dismissed the betrayal—impossible. Something her father would tell her to keep her heart in chains. She must not let him know what a mistake he had made, telling her such a lie. 

Again, a flutter at the window. Nyx was making increasingly rude gestures.

“Look,” she said resolutely, “you know I don’t remember any of this. I know that you’re telling me that I am cruel and that I killed my brother and that I wouldn’t be a good queen and that I am a child, and you say that you want me to be happy, but all you really want me to be is just a princess. You do not want me to make decisions for myself and to make the kingdom a better place. And yes, I do make some bad decisions, I do make some bad decisions sometimes,” she admitted it twice, just to prove to him (to herself) that she would never become her father, “but I’m not cruel, I know that about myself. Because now I have friends,” her heard sang as she gathered momentum, “and you know what? My friends, my friends know that I am loyal to them and I care about them and I do good things for them” (Casselyn, she promised silently, I will find you), “and know that I don’t want to ask you for anything right now. You make me angry and frustrated and I feel like I never want to ask you for anything—but I am here to ask for two diamonds to save my friends, and because I am mature I’m going to ask for them, even though I don’t want anything from you.” She stopped herself from rambling, forcing open some space for him to answer. 

He was silent a long, long time. “I only have one diamond,” he said slowly, each word dripping with something like disdain, or maybe sadness. “It may come as a surprise to you, but we had to use a lot of diamonds resurrecting the fallen, so there aren’t that many left in Phylor.”

It felt too good to be true. She held her breath, hoping not to break the spell. “Fine, I’ll take what’s owed to me and I’ll leave.”

“Owed to you?” he said, his voice rough.

“Yes,” she repeated, knowing he was angry but (surprisingly) not caring. I promise you Casselyn, she repeated in her head. I will find you, and I will find myself too, and maybe, maybe—maybe it could be like before, when we were young and innocent and we smiled so easily.

“If you had gotten what’s owed to you, you would have your head cut off as a rebel and as someone who committed fratricide,” he spat, his face red and his fists clenched. She looked at him, and for the first time she saw him as something other than a threat: an old man who was afraid. She might have pitied him, if he had not wrung it out of her long ago.

“I don’t know why I did it,” she admitted. “I don’t know why! But I know that I’m not cruel. I’m going to spend my life making Phylor a better place now that I know how to do it. Right now this is what I know, so this is what I am going to do.”

“Let the wedding happen,” he said, with an intensity that she did not understand, “and I will give you the diamond.”

She suddenly felt drained, like she had lived a thousand years in this one day. She wrenched Bellator from the floor and turned to leave. “I will meet you here the day after the wedding,” she said, her back to him, not even turning her head, “and make sure that you keep your promise.”

She heard him stand up, but she did not move. She hated herself for using the tools from his arsenal, but it was the only form of power he could understand. Did the ends justify the means? The forgotten Angelica had certainly thought so.

“This is a chance for you,” he said, surprisingly sincere, “to become someone else, to become who you want to be. There is already an Angelica Bane. You can be Angel, you can be Malek, or any of the other names you have used over the past few weeks, but just, I beg of you”—she flinched—“just become someone else and leave Angelica Bane behind.” He paused. “We can put all of this behind us.”

If she did not listen too closely, she could almost pretend he cared. “Well, I know one thing that I don’t want to be,” she said as she walked out, “and that’s your daughter.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [greenglowsgold](https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenglowsgold/pseuds/greenglowsgold#), [Kisthos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kisthos/pseuds/Kisthos), and [Blair Daniels](http://blair-daniels.com/) for help with editing!
> 
> Find "How the Quest was Won" on:[iTunes](https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/how-the-quest-was-won/id1306307953), Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn


End file.
